Grace Livingston Hill
The Story of a Whim (Musaicum Romance Classics)
Illustrator: Etheldred B. Barry
Published by
Books
- Advanced Digital Solutions & High-Quality eBook Formatting -
2020 OK Publishing
EAN 4064066385576
Table of Contents
CHAPTER I. FIVE GIRLS, AN ORGAN, AND THE WHIM
CHAPTER II. A CHRISTMAS BOX THAT DIDN'T MATCH
CHAPTER III. “AND WHAT ARE YOU GOING TO SAY TO HER?"
CHAPTER IV. “A LETTER THAT WROTE ITSELF"
CHAPTER V. A SUNDAY-SCHOOL IN SPITE OF ITSELF
CHAPTER VIII. SAD NEWS FROM THE NORTH
CHAPTER X. VICTORIA HAS A FINGER IN THE PIE
CHAPTER XII. THE WHIM COMPLETES ITS JUSTIFICATION
CHAPTER I
FIVE GIRLS, AN ORGAN, AND THE WHIM
"How cold it is! Lets walk up and down the platform, girls. Why doesn't that train come?"
"I'm going in to see if the agent knows anything about it," said one with determined mouth and big brown eyes.
They waited shivering in a group until she returned, five girls just entering womanhood. They were part of a small house-party, spending Thanksgiving week at the old stone house on the hill above the station, and they had come down to meet another girl who was expected on the train.
"He says the train is half an hour late," said Hazel Winship, the hostess, coming down the stone steps of the station.
"What shall we do? There is not time to make it worthwhile to go back to the house. Shall we go inside, or walk?"
"O, walk by all means," said Victoria Landis. "It is so stuffy and hot in there I feel as if I was a turkey half-roasted now from the little time we stayed there."
"Let us walk up this long platform to that freight-house and see the men unload that car," proposed Esther Wakefield. And so it was agreed.
"Tra la la!" hummed Victoria. "O girls, why didn't we stay and finish singing that glee? It was so pretty! Listen. Is this right?" and she hummed it over again.
"Yes, it was too bad to have to tear ourselves away from that dear piano," said Ruth Summers. "Say, Hazel, what are you going to do with your poor despised organ? Send it to a home missionary?"
"I'll send it somewhere, I suppose. I don't know anyone around here to give it to. I wish I could send it where it would give pleasure to someone."
"There are probably plenty of people who would be delighted with it if you only knew them. The owner of this forlorn furniture, for instance," said Victoria as they separated to thread their way between boxes and chairs that had been shoved out on the platform from a half-emptied freight-car. "Girls, just look at that funny old stove and those uncomfortable chairs! How would you like to set up housekeeping with that?"
“‘THE COUCH ISN'T SO BAD IF IT WERE COVERED’”
"The couch isn't so bad if it were covered," said Hazel, poking it in a gingerly way with her gloved finger. "It looks as though it might have been comfortable once."
"That’s Hazel all over!" said Esther. "If it were possible, she would just enjoy having that couch stay over a train or two while she recovered it with some bright denim, and made a pillow for it;" and dear girlish laughter rang out, while Hazel's cheeks grew pink as she joined in.
"Well, girls, wouldn't that be interesting? Just think how pleased the dear old lady who owns it would be when she found the new cover, and how entirely mystified."
"You might send her your organ," suggested Ruth Summers. "Perhaps she would like that just as well."
"What a lovely idea!" said Hazel, her eyes shining with enthusiasm. “I’ll just do it. Come, lets look for the address."
"You romantic little goose!" exclaimed her friends. “Take her away! The perfect idea! I just believe she would!"
"Of course I would," said Hazel; "why shouldn't I? Papa said I might do as I pleased with it. Here, there is a card behind here. Read it. 'Christie W. Bailey, Pine Ridge, Fla.' Girls, I shall do it. Who has a pencil? I want to write it down. Do all these things belong to the same person? Look on their cards. She must be very poor."
"Poor as a church mouse," said Victoria, "if this is all she has."
"I should like to inquire how you are so sure it is a 'she,'" said Emily Whitten; "'Christie' sounds as though it might belong to a man or a boy. Don't you think so, Victoria?"
"It’s an old colored mammy, I'm positive." said Victoria.
"I don't care," said Hazel of the firm mouth. "If they are black people they will enjoy it all the more. Black people are fond of music, and it will be a real help for the little children. But I don't believe Christie is an old mammy at all. She is a girl about our own age. She has had to go to Florida on account of her health, and she is poor, too poor to board; so she will keep house in a room or two,"—waving her hand toward the unpretentious huddling of furniture about them,—"and perhaps she teaches school. She will put the organ in the schoolroom, or have a Sunday-school in her own home, and I shall write her a note and send some music for the children to learn. She can do lots of nice things with that organ."
"Now, Hazel," protested five voices, but just then the shriek of a whistle brought them all about face and flying down the platform to reach the station before the train drew up. In the bustle of welcoming the newcomer Hazel's scheme was forgotten, and not until when in the evening they were seated about the great open fire did it again come into the conversation. It was Victoria Landis who told the newcomer about it, beginning with: "O Marion, you can't think what Hazel's latest wild scheme of philanthropy is."
But Marion, a girl after Hazel's own heart, listened with